http://strategyst.com/wordpress Customers, Technology & Management Mon, 19 Nov 2007 04:45:39 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en It has been pretty crazy in the latter half of 2007. All good stuff, new baby, new job, new house, but not much time for blogging. I'll pick it up again soon, I promise. Thanks for checking in and the words of encouragement. http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/11/19/ill-be-back-soon/ Another article that I published last month... enjoy. By Andrew Boyd CRM Buyer 10/01/07 4:00 AM PT Sales teams are missing revenue targets, not hitting quota and facing stalled opportunities as organizations strive to remain competitive and service increasingly discerning customers. In response, sales managers are still focused on lead quality, but they've also ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/11/19/developing-a-smarter-sales-organization/ Here is an article that I wrote last month with a colleague. By Andrew Boyd and Ian Michiels CRM Buyer 10/18/07 4:00 AM PT Last month, Aberdeen surveyed over 617 companies to identify the strategies, capabilities and enablers that Best in Class companies use to improve demand generation practices. The research reveals that leading ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/11/19/sales-and-marketing-alignment-one-lead-one-view-one-result/ Originally posted on: CRM Buyer 07/12/07 4:00 AM PT Poor data quality can impact an organization in a myriad of ways: Employees wasting time checking and rechecking their work, the unnecessary cost of redoing mundane tasks and dissatisfied customers screaming at the other end of the phone are just a few of the ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/07/29/customer-data-quality-a-sales-and-marketing-leadership-issue/ I am working on a new study on sales effectiveness: The research will examine the methods, processes and technologies that sales management can use to improve sales productivity from the point of view of the salesperson. Recommendations from the study will help managers improve close rates, reduce sales cycle times and ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/06/21/new-research-on-sales-effectiveness/ Here is an article on customer self service that I wrote for CRM Buyer. A successful self-service strategy does not solely focus on pushing customers to the Web to drive down costs and relieve overburdened call center agents. Instead, it is about giving the customer options to service their own needs ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/06/21/how-may-you-help-me/ Another study that my team is working on is data quality and integration: With the proliferation of data silos, and rising costs of maintaining and leveraging customer information, customer data management is becoming a line-management issue. This report will identify and examine the organizational and technological processes that best-in-class companies implement ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/05/10/data-quality-and-integration-that-old-chestnut/ After my post on my upcoming research, an article was sent to me on IBM “firing its customers”. The big news in the article is a rumored restructuring at IBM, but buried toward the end of the article was this tidbit: ... Global Services will be eliminating not just employees ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/05/08/mr-customer-youre-fired/ Salesforce.com is running a contest to help name its new small business edition.  Perhaps they should just go ahead and call it the "Small And Growing Enterprise" Edition... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/05/07/crm-for-small-and-growing-enterprises/ As I am settling into my new role, I am starting to look at what my research agenda is going to look like over the next year or so. Right now, I am working on a study on customer value management for publication in June. Basically, the study: identifies and examines ... http://strategyst.com/wordpress/2007/05/07/keep-your-best-customers-fire-the-rest/